


I just keep on hopin' that you'll call me

by grainyangel



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, happy-adjacent if open ending, needless angst, no further questions your honor, potent repression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-31 10:43:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21146618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grainyangel/pseuds/grainyangel
Summary: In which Brock overthinks and has a crisis and thinks Petey doesn't like him anymore and Petey is like, dude, chill





	I just keep on hopin' that you'll call me

**Author's Note:**

> the author is both procrastinating and projecting
> 
> title is from a post malone song, robyn said there'd be consequences and she was right and here they are

Brock was slow getting showered and changed after. Petey had been fast, packing up and putting on his headphones in the weird way across his forehead that he did instead of just putting them around his neck, and he’d gone out into the stands to sign autographs for some kids. 

This game had been the last half of a back-to-back and rounded off a week with several doozy games; two shoot-out decisions, both wins, and the scrappy Devs game where the only goal scored was from the wrong Hughes. (It had been his first, apparently, and Quinn had told them that their entire family had been there. Brock was happy for the guy. He would have liked to have won the game though.) 

They were doing well. Really well. Brock felt good about hockey. He felt good.

They hadn’t sat together on the plane to New York, Petey and Brock, and that was fine, they usually didn’t, it wasn’t new. Petey sat with Quinn. Everybody had regular seatmates. It helped with getting settled and taking off without fuss. 

Brock usually played cards on flights. Otherwise it would just be hours and hours of his own thoughts and that was the last thing he wanted right now. He wanted to do stuff. With people. It had been a good and happy but tough summer for several reasons and now he was here and he didn’t want to think about those reasons he wanted things to be good and easy because the thing about hockey was, okay maybe it wasn’t easy, but it was simple, hockey was good because if something was going wrong Brock could skate harder or make a hit or move the puck and change it and make the problem go away. Real life wasn’t that simple. It drove Brock crazy to think about. 

So he tried to do things so he didn’t have to think so much. Like hang out with Petey, fuck around, go out to eat or to the beach, out on the water, stuff like that. Except Petey was hanging out with Quinn, and Chris who made them dinner sometimes and if Brock was being honest Chris probably didn’t need Petey’s help feeding the new kid. 

(And Brock knew he was being mean and he didn’t like it, he didn’t like being grumpy, but he felt grumpy and that just made him grumpier.)

(Petey and Q probably barely said a word to each other on flights. Brock liked the kid, he was brilliant on the ice, seemed kind, patient, could pull the trigger on a shot like nobody’s business, shook their power play awake by the shoulders, he was no great conversationalist though. Not that Petey was a big talker on flights. There was nothing weird about it.) 

(Was that mean? Probably not. Maybe. Whatever.)

And Petey had sort of taken the kid under his wing. Petey was good like that. Quinn was new and young and Petey was right there to help him like he was trying to be everything he could have wanted when he was a rookie. Was that what this was? Petey making up for something he felt like he’d been missing. Fuck, Brock really hoped it wasn’t. 

Brock and Petey had known each other almost a year and a half. It felt like longer than that but it wasn’t, apparently. And sure, the two hadn’t become friends right away, Brock wasn’t the type to just throw himself at people right out of the gate, and neither was Petey. He was sort of reserved or whatever in that Scandinavian way, he was warm though, once you got to know him, and maybe like, one of the best guys Brock had ever met. 

Reporters spent Petey’s whole rookie season talking about death stares and shit like that. They didn’t know him at all. Petey was the most patient and understanding guy on the entire team. Reporters were idiots. Mean, but whatever. It was their own fault for asking stupid questions.

Anyway, slow start, slow friends, but then suddenly, very fast. 

Throughout the season they’d made magic on the ice, like, _magic_, and that magic had sort of followed them off it too. It had been sort of a magical season. Sure, they hadn’t made the playoffs but no one had really expected them to. A bummer but not a tragedy. But something about the whole year had felt so new and… something. Brock didn’t know what to call it. It had been something. 

Brock knew himself well enough to know that it kind of took him a while to warm up to people, but he had his reasons. You can’t just open your heart or whatever to every new rookie or every new linemate or teammate, and Brock hadn’t exactly been on the hunt for a new best friend. But then Petey had happened. 

That’s what it had felt like. He had _happened._

And he was so unexpected in every way. Every single thing about him had caught Brock off guard. Brock hadn’t put guards up because he’d had no idea that he would need to. Out of nowhere, there Petey was, and he had exploded onto the scene and into the league and into Brock’s life. In his strange, shy, unexpected way he had seeped into little nooks and crevices of Brock’s life that Brock hadn’t even known were there.

Toward the end of the season Brock had let Petey know that he was welcome in Minnesota anytime if he wanted. They could go out on the lake or something. Just hang. Whatever. He was welcome any time.

Petey had said he’d love to go.

But Petey hadn’t come to visit over the summer. He’d been busy. Busy with off-season shit just like everyone. Busy with family and friends and Sweden and training. Regular shit. 

Brock had had plenty to do himself. He hadn’t needed any help finding stuff to do or people to see. He spent time with his family. That was the most important thing. Family. And that was good. Brock wouldn’t have had it any other way. Seriously. Petey hadn’t come to visit though. Brock felt like such an asshole. The summer had been… lots of stuff happened. And Brock got to be with his family. That was good.

When asked about Brock and that whole contract business around when camp had started Petey had said that he’d go to Minnesota and get Brock himself if he had to. Brock had read it more than once. (Sometimes he’d pull it up on his phone just to read it again, to make sure Petey had really said that and that it wasn’t just something Brock had made up while restlessly killing time back home before it all got sorted.)

In the end Petey hadn’t had to. And that was for the best really. How would he even have done it? Jumped on a plane? Gotten in a car a driven? It didn’t matter anyway because Brock was back and the contract was sorted and that was all that mattered.

Maybe Petey had only said that stuff to be funny. Petey was funny. Unexpectedly funny. Dry and deadpan. He was big on sarcasm. He made Brock laugh a lot. It was kind of embarrassing. Brock could never think of any good comebacks so he just went with his lame comebacks instead. Better than nothing. (“Of course, I like everything Petey does.” Idiot.) Or maybe not.

It was Brock’s own fault. He hadn’t just asked once. He’d asked, like, ten times. Twenty maybe. Every single time Brock talked to him for like the final week of the season, _do you wanna come to Minnesota, you can come to Minnesota if you want, there’s a lake, there’s nature, there’s a cabin_. Like Petey didn’t have all of those things back home. Obviously he was going back there to see his family and friends. Old friends. 

That was probably it. Brock was completely lame and Petey had finally realized. That’s why he was being like this. That’s why things felt different. Weird. Petey had had enough.

Brock had overdone it and Petey decided he’d rather hang out with Quinn. 

Quinn knew when to shut up. Quinn didn’t blush like an idiot all the time. Quinn was chill. And, alright, if Brock didn’t know better he might think that Q was just like, constantly stoned. Brock knew he wasn’t. But he looked it. And he was new. He was just a kid though. Or. Well. He was only one year younger than Petey, two years younger than Brock. Whatever. All rookies were kids. 

The point was, Petey didn’t seek Brock like he had last year. It was kind of pathetic for Brock to expect him to, he knew that. And besides, yeah, they’d hung out off the ice a lot, sure, but a lot of the time they’d been paired up for different promo content, videos, events, and it hadn’t even been Petey’s choice to hang out with him he’d just been told to. They’d had fun though. Brock was sure they’d had fun. Brock had had fun anyway. He’d thought Petey did too.

So. Jesus. Alright. Brock felt good about hockey, but not as good as he could feel, not as good as he felt like he should, not as good as he wanted to. He felt fine about hockey but something was up. Something was up and it made hockey not feel as good as Brock thought it should feel. 

He felt lonely. Or maybe lonely wasn’t it. Isolated. Brock wasn’t a genius with words but he felt like there was something, in a way, between him and everybody else. Like bubble wrap? No. Like glass, maybe. Almost. He could see everyone around him fine, but it was like he was apart from them, like he couldn’t quite get to them, couldn’t quite reach. And it wasn’t just Petey, it was just, he felt it the most starkly with Petey, because Petey had been so close. But it was Bo too. It was everyone. 

It was just a funk. Everybody had funks. Everybody went through their own weird shit. Brock was going through something weird and it happened to everybody and it was fine. Everything was fine. Brock didn’t feel, well, fine, though. But he did. He felt good. He was good. 

Petey had gotten bigger over the summer, Brock had noticed right away the first time he saw him just when he’d gotten back to Vancouver.

Petey was long and lanky. He’d looked almost fragile when he’d first shown up in Vancouver. Brock pretty quickly found out that he wasn’t. Fragile, that was. Petey could lay and take a hit. His one-timer was lethal. Literally, probably. He could do real damage, lithe as he was. Petey could do a lot of things. Skinny and pale and not actually shy and not cautious and not quiet. Unexpected. Good at everything and just good. Petey was good people. Brock liked good people. 

Tangent. 

Petey had said he was going to go back and train and come back bigger, and he had. He was still kind of lanky, he was Petey after all. But he was definitely bigger. Wider. Bigger body, more strength, more damage. Brock couldn’t wait to see what Petey was going to do with it all.

After the whole thing with the contract, Brock had been relieved and happy to finally be there and join the team and see the guys and see Petey, and like, Bo and Jake and everyone. 

Petey, like Brock, was a hugger. A proper hugger. That was another unexpected thing about him. They’d hugged. Petey’s arms... Yeah. Bigger. Chest bigger. He was a little wider all over. Not much, but enough that Brock noticed. 

He felt the scratch of his translucent facial hair in the hug. It wasn’t a beard, it was barely stubble, Brock couldn’t stop noticing it though after that, on Petey’s chin and jaw and lip.

They’d gone to the mall together, one day that first week back, gone shopping, gotten food. (Fro-yo. Peach flavor, the best one. Brock got cereal and mini marshmallows for toppings, Petey got fresh fruit.) That day Brock had been sure this season was going to be just as good as the last one, maybe even better. Magic hadn’t gone anywhere.

But then, and it wasn’t that something was changing, it felt more like something had already changed without Brock noticing, until now. He didn’t know what it was or why, but something was different, and Petey was being different. Brock didn’t know. He didn’t know! He had no idea what it was, so he didn’t know what to say or how to say it or anything. He didn’t know what questions to ask. 

He felt weirdly cold. Like, he felt like himself, and everything felt the same, and everything was fine, but then he’d look at Petey and it was like Petey would look away when he did, like he didn’t want to meet Brock’s eye or something like that, and Brock would get… cold. 

It was so stupid. Brock was probably making the whole thing up. So fucking stupid. 

Brock couldn’t stop though. He didn’t want to feel like this but he also couldn’t stop. 

Petey knew a lot of people. He knew so many people. He was very loved. He had his family and lots of friends back in Sweden and the whole team and probably the whole organization and Brock didn’t know of a single person who’d ever met him and not loved him. 

It was completely ridiculous to think Brock could be number one out of everybody Petey knew. It wasn’t realistic. 

Besides, when it came to someone as loved and liked as Petey, someone who so many people wanted something to do with, and among whom Petey could choose whoever he wanted to be friends with, just being among those he chose was huge. 

And Pete had chosen Brock. They’d sort of chosen each other. 

Their lives were kind of crazy, Brock knew that, so it made a lot of sense that they had both chosen each other to let inside each their bubble. They had stuff in common. It felt good to have each other.

And maybe, if Brock had been chosen as one of the few, he could live with not being number one. 

Brock was selfish, and he wanted weird things sometimes, but he also knew that the things he wanted didn’t always match up with the things that he could have. 

He just really hoped, really, _really_ hoped that Petey hadn’t changed his mind about choosing him. He hoped he was still one of Petey’s people. He still wanted Petey to be one of his.

Okay. Okay! Brock knew he was overreacting. He was spiraling. Whatever. It hadn’t even been right away when he got back, that he’d felt the, like, shift or whatever. He was being dramatic. Petey was still his same self. Petey still teased him in his downplayed way. Brock was being dramatic, he knew that. It had only been different for a couple of weeks. 

Something was different, though. It was. Maybe Brock was kind of losing it. It was probably nothing and Brock was freaking out for no reason. Petey had been taking care of Quinn and he’d been busy and they were still friends and there was nothing to worry about and everything was fine. 

Like, why wouldn’t everything be fine? It was fine.

It wasn’t like Quinn was trying to steal Petey away from Brock since, again, the kid was talented, had the making of young star et cetera, but Brock didn’t think he had it in him. He also had no reason to. 

People didn’t belong to other people. People didn’t own their friends. Not even best friends. Were Brock and Petey actually best friends? Best friends didn’t seem like the right thing to call it. 

Besides, Brock already had best friends, and that was different from like… Or, well. Brock and Pete were sort of best friends. Maybe. Or, they weren’t. Like, they both had friends they knew better and had known for longer. Brock’s other best friends were completely different from Petey, though. Like, it wasn’t like the way he was friends with Coley or… it was different. It was just different.

But Petey was special. They were friends and Petey was special. He was different from the rest of Brock’s friends, he was different from everyone Brock knew. Was that what _best friends_ was? Your best friend should be the one friend of yours you liked just a little better than all the rest of them, right? Brock just liked Petey a lot. He just really, really liked him. So, some kind of best friends. Simple logic. Or maybe not. 

Brock had thought a lot about what it was that was different. Gut-feeling alone wasn’t really much go on. He tried to pinpoint what exactly it was that had changed. If he could do that then he’d know for sure. Whatever it was he was trying to figure out.

Did Petey smile less? Probably not. Maybe? It most likely didn’t have anything to do with Brock if he did. Like, it was really selfish of Brock to assume it had anything to do with him. Petey had his own life, his own things. Brock was being so selfish.

Brock had heard someone mention that somebody had said something about Petey and a sophomore slump. Like six points in eight games was a slump. At the time it had been six in six. So he hadn’t produced in the last two. Most of the guys in the league produced a fraction of that. Brock had seven. Without Petey he would have had half that. ‘Slump’ his ass. 

Brock was absolutely making up that Petey wasn’t meeting his eye, and that Petey was quieter, that he didn’t put as much weight in his one-timers as he used to, that he didn’t seem to trust Brock as much as he used to in the ice, pulling less crazy stunts than he used to. 

Guys tried different things all the time, Petey was passing and shooting like only Petey could and sometimes it paid off and sometimes it didn’t. That magic shit he’d do sometimes was the exception, not the rule, Brock knew he couldn’t expect shit like that every single night. It was fine. Nothing was different. He was just overthinking it. Yeah. He was definitely just overthinking it.

So since they didn’t sit together on the plane, they hadn’t gotten off together either. They hadn’t sat together on the bus. And Brock considered waiting a second so they could walk side by side but then he didn’t because Petey was wearing headphones and was listening to music or something and he probably wanted to be left alone so he could get in the zone. Brock left him alone. 

Brock misjudged and overshot and lost his balance playing two-touch before the game and overdid the tumble for the camera and thumping his chest with his fist, pretty sure it was going on Instagram. He didn’t really give a shit about making a fool of himself. He just wanted to go out and play.

Petey had been quiet, stretching alone on the floor of the room. Brock hadn’t watched him. He’d just gone through his own routine, getting ready for the game and getting in the right headspace. Stuff he had control over. Hockey was good. Hockey was easy. He felt good. Good about hockey. Good about the game. Good. He also felt a little bit like something was about to happen and he didn’t know what and it made him nervous. But mostly he felt good. Ready to play. And good.

Bo had potted his 100thcareer goal to get them on the board in the first. Brock was stoked for him.

Petey was the first one there to throw his arms around Brock after he scored that second goal. It probably didn’t mean anything, but at the same time maybe it did. Celly was celly, celly was sacred. 

Beagle had gotten them the third. A beauty, truly. Highlight reel stuff.

And they’d won the game. It had been weird and anticlimactic because of something with the clock and for a full two minutes no one was sure if the game was really over or not. But it was, and they’d beaten the Rangers by one. Markstrom had really saved their asses in a big way in the third, without him the result might have looked very different. 

Brock was one of the last guys to leave the room and so one of the last on the bus. Despite the win, he wasn’t really in the mood to make small talk or to meet anybody’s eyes, he was tired. He just looked for an open seat to drop down into. He didn’t know how long the drive to the hotel was going to be, but he was just glad that they didn’t have to get back on the plane until tomorrow.

He was making his way down the aisle at a snail’s pace when he felt something tug on his sleeve. Someone. 

“Boes.”

Pete was by the window, and the seat next to him was empty.

“You wanna sit here?” Petey asked. He had his headphones half on and half off. They were sort of crooked across his head. 

“You sure?” Brock asked, like an idiot.

“Uh-huh.”

Brock sat. 

Quinn, who must have been behind Brock, came up looking half confused and fully blitzed, which wasn’t his fault that was just his face. He looked at them both for a second and then just kept going to find a free seat for himself.

No one said anything as Brock settled in and got comfortable, fixing his clothes so his hoodie didn’t fold weird against his back

Petey took his headphones off.

“Nice goal,” he said after a little bit.

“Thanks” said Brock.

The bus engine came on. It wasn’t too loud, but the hum of it put a kind of blanket over all other sounds. 

The noise was comforting. He got nervous for a second that Petey might not want to talk if he had to lean in to do so, and at the same time he liked the fact that if they did talk everybody else wouldn’t be listening.

The bus moved and began to make its way out of and away from the compound that was MSG.

“Boes,” Petey said again after a moment.

“Yeah?”

“Is… is something wrong?” Petey asked. 

“Huh?” Brock asked.

“Is something wrong?” Petey asked again thinking perhaps that Brock genuinely hadn’t heard him.

Brock didn’t know what to say. He wanted to tell the truth, but he wasn’t sure what that was. He didn’t know if something was wrong or not. Well, some things were, but he didn’t know if those were the things the Petey was asking about.

“I don’t know how else to say it but like, it’s like you are smiling less,” Petey said, before Brock had made his mind up about a response.

Brock felt a little stunned by the straightforwardness of the question. He’d been thinking something like it, but just thinking about saying it out loud made him woozy. Maybe that was a Swedish thing or something. Just saying what you’re thinking. 

Maybe just a Petey thing.

Huh. Well. He was here now. And Petey had asked him a question and Brock thought, despite not knowing, well, anything really, that now might as well be the time to try… something. He had to try something. He was going to try something.

“Are we…” Brock was more nervous that he remembered being in a while. 

What if he finished the question and he didn’t get the answer he wanted? There were a thousand horrible possible answers that he didn’t want to hear. 

What if asked and got a bad answer and then they still had to go and room together at the hotel and at every hotel for the rest of the season at least and play on their line together and train together and see each other every single day with the bad answer hanging between them.

Brock swallowed around the lump in his throat.

But there were good answers too. 

Brock was doing it again. He was only thinking about negative stuff. He had to stop doing that. There were plenty answers he wouldn’t love but would be okay with. There were answers that… he didn’t know what the best answer could be. 

He didn’t know what he was hoping Petey would say. He knew there were good answers too, though. And Brock wouldn’t know which one he was going to get until he’d asked the question. It wasn’t eloquent but it was something. _Something_ was what he’d been going for so _something_ would have to do. 

“Are we good?” Brock finally asked. “Like, are we okay? You, uh, you and me, I mean.” 

Petey just looked at him for a second and Brock couldn’t determine if he looked surprised or incredulous or what, and he didn’t like it at all. 

Brock looked down. Away. 

“’Okay’? Did something happen?” Petey asked.

“I mean, we’re… we’re friends, right? We’re friends?” Brock asked his shoes.

“Yes, of course we’re friends, why are you saying this?”

“Like,” Brock looked out of the window next to Petey’s head. He kept his voice low, even with the sounds from the street outside. “We’re real friends?”

“Yeah. Of course.”

“And you’re not, like, mad at me?” Brock wanted to… do something. He sounded so pathetic. _Are you mad at me?_ Ugh. He just took a deep breath. 

“I’m not mad, why do you think I’m mad at you?”

“I don’t know, I’m sorry, I’m being weird, forget I asked.”

“Brock, why do you think I’m mad?”

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

“No, it’s not nothing, did something happen? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yes, I’m fine, it’s fine, I’m just– I’m being weird. Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re making me kind of worried.”

Brock looked around him, he didn’t want anyone else to overhear. It wasn’t anybody else’s business. No one was looking at them.

“It’s stupid really, it’s just, I don’t know, it feels weird.” Brock wanted gesticulate to try and show it, but it didn’t have a shape that he could make out with his hands. He put his hands on his legs instead from something to hold on to. “I know this sounds weird, but like, something feels different… I guess…”

“With what?”

“I don’t know. With, um, with, uh, us I guess? Cus I guess since you’re hanging out with Hughesy more and stuff, and it feels like you’ve been, I don’t know, more, like, distant, I guess, which is like, so selfish of me to say, like,” Brock was secretly hoping that Petey would interrupt him or tell him to shut up or something but Petey didn’t do either of those things, “I think I can have you all to myself which obviously I know I can’t, you can do whatever you want. I’m being so selfish, and I don’t know, I’m probably making this shit up, I’m just being weird. I’m just. I’m totally freaking out for no reason.” Brock shot a quick look at Petey’s face before looking down and. Petey was looking at Brock, Brock’s face, but not at his eyes. Brock looked down at Petey’s hand resting in his lap. Petey scratching at his fore finger with his thumbnail. “Right?” 

God, if only Brock’s breath was a little steadier, then Petey might think it was nothing, just stupid thing that didn’t matter. Petey knowing what it all meant… Brock didn’t even really know what he meant, but Petey knowing it was big, important, it was terrifying.

“I’m freaking out for no reason, right?”

Brock felt like he wasn’t being fair. 

If Petey really didn’t want… whatever it was Brock wanted, then he’d just put him on the spot for a really unpleasant conversation. 

And Petey could talk, it wasn’t that he wasn’t a talker but his first language wasn’t English.

His English was good, sure, but Brock was talking a lot and asking a lot of questions, and he wasn’t considering Petey at all he wasn’t waiting for him to think. Brock barely knew how to say whatever it was he was trying to say and that wasn’t fair at all. Brock shut up. 

He still couldn’t make himself look at Petey’s face. He was still watching Petey’s hands.

He watched Petey clench his fist for a second and then open his hand. He watched Petey lift a hand from his lap.

Brock watched as he reached that hand over, slowly, so slowly, across the armrest to where Brock’s fingers were digging into his thigh, and he put his pale hand on Brock’s.

“I don’t really know how to say…” Petey began, and Brock instantly felt bad. “But we’re good. We’re good. I’m serious. And I’m not mad.” Petey squeezed Brock’s hand lightly. “We’re friends. I didn’t… forgot… about you. I didn’t replace you.” Brock loosened his grip and turned his hand under Petey. “And… It’s just Quinn. I’m still… I’m still here. Don’t worry.” 

“Hey, sorry…” Brock began. Petey interlaced his fingers with Brock’s. Gave his hand another soft squeeze.

“Don’t worry so much,” he said. “I don’t know what– how you’ll believe me but I mean it.”

Brock closed his own fingers around Petey’s hand. 

“You never, uh, came to Minnesota,” Brock said, and Petey looked up and Brock did too, meeting his eyes. Only for a moment though. Petey looked away again before he replied, dropping his chin slightly.

“I… I wasn’t sure if you really wanted me to come,” Petey said.

“What?”

“Like, I didn’t know if maybe you just said it to be nice.”

“Wha– Jesus, Petey I meant it. I was so serious. I still am. If you want. Anytime. I still want you, anytime you want you can come.”

“Okay.”

“Wow,” Brock ran his free hand through his hair. “I really thought– I thought you didn’t want to, I thought… that it was me… _I_ thought _you_ only said it to be nice, that maybe you just. Man…”

Petey laughed a little. Brock couldn’t help doing the same.

“I wouldn’t offer if didn’t mean it. Seriously.” Brock was so relieved he almost felt dizzy. Yeah. Relief. That was definitely it. Something else too, maybe, but he’d think about that some other time, whatever that was. The relief was intoxicating.

“Jesus,” he said again, “I thought… I thought…” He didn’t want to finish the sentence. He didn’t want to say it out loud, especially not now, when he knew it wasn’t true.

Petey opened his mouth like was going to say something else but then didn’t. He just squeezed Brock’s hand again, and Brock squeezed back. 

Brock felt a lot of that weird coldness that had been simmering just under his skin leak out of him, and warmth filling him up instead. 

He looked out at the other heads he could see from his seat. They were all either dozing off or watching their phones or having their own conversations. No one was paying attention to them. 

He looked at Petey. They looked at each other. No one said anything.

Brock slid down in the chair a bit and leaned his head against Petey’s shoulder. He felt Petey put his cheek against the top of Brock’s head. 

The bus rumbled along, stopping and starting with traffic and lights. Brock closed his eyes.

“You know you can come, right?” Petey said. “When I do stuff with Q. You can come along.”

“Yeah.”

“I mean it.”

“Yeah, yeah I know.”

“Will you? I’d like if you did.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”


End file.
